Observations of my friends game progression and departure

General
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So its rare I find a game worthwhile enough that I go out and buy the game for my friends…

But I took this path in boundless, and its interesting the results I have witnessed.

I have 4 friends in question and they all took a very similar trajectory thru boundless life and all departed at about the same point in there adventure…

They all seemed to enjoy the game quite a bit and they jumped right into plotting up there homestead and layout out there builds and getting there machines etc…

However they all seemed to his a wall at the same place. Gem’s and Power coils, they seemed to not be inclined to go to other planets to mine gems, primarily because the mobs wrecked them. So I set up mines for them to avoid the mobs and at first it was working but again they seemed un-inspired and I would find them back on the home world mining?!? Why I asked and I would here the gems were not worth it the blocks were to hard to break etc etc…

So I attempted to take them on small hunts to Elopor doing low level meteors and at first they enjoyed that, and then they attempted to do those same small hunts without me and the end results were not good. So they quit trying to hunt.

Eventually they just stopped playing and when I would ask why it was the same answer the game is too grindy to hard to progress. I told them they needed to do the feats, Log wood, mine etc and get the nice 40K feats for those things… They did not seem impressed with this…

This seemed to happen around lvl 25 for all of them and I wondered why I had no issue going past lvl 25 and I believe the answer is my base builds where Larger in my mind then theirs, they built more humble sized structures then I did, I also built roads for my town etc… and multiple buildings for different purposes…

They all were content with 1 decent sized building to accomplish storage, crafting the whole 9 yards…

So ultimately I think there builds did not push them to reach the 40K prestige feats and I have a feeling this is common. And because of that people hit similiar brick walls at around lvl 25…

Also they all walked the same life of a crafter builder and I also feel this playstyle is going to be most prevalent for new players aswell…

So my suggestion are this…
Lower the requirements to reach the 40K’s in Mining and Gathering so there naturally hitting people around lvl 25 with modest build’s

Create more rewarding lower level monster content… that’s actually easier to do. You should never get an Elite Mob on a Moon World… The only Strong Mobs you should see on a Moon World should come in Meteors…

We need to find a way to smooth out the transition between lvl 25 - 35 as the game is a very different game past lvl 35 as most everything starts to open up…

And finally the last suggestion:
Take a really hard look at the;

Power Coils / Forge / Gumming up the crafting progression with over complex things.
Because your average new player is just not going to understand that Power Coils are an Optional piece of equipment for people who want to specialize in crafting. When they find the mobs in the moon worlds crushing them and come to the conclusion that they need Gem Gear! Thus Power Coils are Mandatory, thus brick wall…

Which brings me to the last recommendation…
Gold, Silver, Titanium Weapons need a dramatic boost vrs Stout and Strong mobs…

To help facilitate the natural progression of difficulty and maybe change the perception that Power Coils and Gems are mandatory…

Moon Worlds should be a place a lvl 25-30 crafter can feel like they can walk around and gather safely that its inside of there range of difficulty…

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2

Great feedback. Thanks!!

We’re doing more creature + weapon + world balance as we’re preparing the 1.0 world progression.

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Also, I believe the forge is going to change the way we look at alloy tools and weapons (just a hunch)

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Hopefully it won’t introduce even more steps and materials required just to make simple items.

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I hope not, I believe the forge will ADD to items, not be a requirement for the item itself. I have no inside info just gathering from what I’ve seen

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The forge giveth, and the forge taketh away!

I’m not sure whether current tool characteristics will remain, so it might add more steps to get a diamond syther hammer as opposed to a diamond hammer, but again, I don’t know.

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I hope that’s the case too :smiley: …I’m sure we won’t have to wait too long now

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I do not see how the forge helps the issue that was raised by @Sulfurblade. All it does is add another machine you need to construct if you want to make any of the advanced items that will be part of its function. I would think that a new person would see it as another hurdle to cross in order to produce items. If they perceive that there are already too many hurdles and the game is too grindy, this could make it worse.

Hopefully as @james said there are some changes planned that will make it less grindy for new people so they feel they are making enough progress to stay interested in the game.

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I’m curious, how many in-game hours did each of your friends end up playing?

I think everyone just thrives on variety until they find something they like repeating. That thing is really different for everyone and is not necessarily the fault of any one game.

Don’t get me wrong, if there are things that would help them stay, then I’m all for that too. I find it interesting to read these stories.

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Forge is a low level basic machine that allows you to add perks and quirks to low level items- making them interesting and experimental. It does scale to higher levels too.

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That is good information to have.

Thank you.

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Don’t forget defects!

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Y’all need spleef in your life. (I know off topic, just passing by)

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I brought up the forge mainly in response to this, that’s how i feel it might directly affect the issue brought up by sulfurblade.

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its definitely not fair for lower level players, especially ones that are not familiar to the way exp works in this game.

The only tolerable way to level is through hunting I dont care what anyone says.

New players need more help, we high level 50 players yawn at these mobs but to someone at their level just beginning its terrifying.

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I have usually just played the minimum each day on each of my characters to get the bonus. If in a hurry I only hunt as it is the fastest way to get experience. Preferably I find herds of stout mobs as they get over double the experience if I remember. When I first started I figured out real fast to either find a place I couldn’t be attacked before shooting at them, or, build something with rocks or sand I mined to be protected before attacking. It’s not difficult if you think of those things. You are dead meat though if you don’t. lol I deleted one of my characters today and in a few minutes I’ll start a new one on a planet I have nothing just so I can see what it’s like as a new player today. Maybe I’ll make a regular habit of that because by about level 25 just with a iron weapon it’s kind of boring because there is no challenge (unless I go to Vulpto to have fun lol). Maybe I’ll write some comments about starting new in a few days if I remember.

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Yeah I was lucky enough to immediately grasp hunting back in the day gems dropped from cuttles.

However now I feel so braindead with an exp pie… with a good group of people thats a solid 800k-1mil exp every 1 hour and 40 minutes give or take.

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i have to say i do not agree
i came back and started brand new, i’m a new player and had no difficulties
in my opinion is helping new players that makes them go away…

imagine that you arrive and: someone give you money that you don’t know how to get, another one build for you machines to craft things you don’t know, tou miss the value of a 10c or 1000c, you haven’t yet killed even a wildstock in a level 1 planet the only thing you know is that with the gem bow they gift you they just die.

what happen when the “newplayer aura” vanish? simple: you face all the difficulties all together: suddenly you need 3-6 k for a bow, you understand you wasted diamond hammers on a level 1 planets and that whatever you have learned of the game is zero and your experience wasn’t “your”, everything mitigated by others. and like a robot you went on group hunt and now you are lvl 50 in 10 days! yuppiiiii!!!
what happens then? simple: they go away.
just let newplayers have theyr experience, when they ask just answer strictly the question, if they ask about “iron” answer “Iron”, no need to add “but gems are far more cool”

personally i’ve gone trough every and each stage, started with a wooden bow, and went up slowly as i crafted every thing i was using, reached lvl 35 without partecipating any group hunt and if i had questions i just asked on discord and simply ignored who told me to rush.

if you help people, they will need you forever
if you let them find theyr way, they will be happy and proud

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I got my first three characters all up to between level 36 - 39 with the gifts I got left on a shelf (except the copper ones I used) that were gems. The gem ones are still on the shelf. I did use the iron ones, but, not until I was making iron ones myself too.

The character I deleted I didn’t even bother looking to see how much money they had or get whatever they were carrying from them. I then created a character a few days ago that I play a little each day on a planet I have nothing and don’t get anything from my others. I’m using stone tools and weapons at the moment (and likely will keep them awhile this time so I get the feats for breaking x number since my other characters never have gotten those feats due to only having one wooden, then one stone, one copper and then was into iron and everything spread out over three characters). So, this one will get the first feat with stone as I use up one of everything each day. So far it’s level 11 and having no problems. I only died once and that was with the wood the first day when I accidentally got three wildstock after me at once since two were behind a bush and I didn’t see them. I learned to be more careful. lol

I never have used Discord and so I don’t get advice although I do learn a few things reading the forums.

With the new character, as I mentioned in another thread I think, I do recommend the developers put in an objective with an explanation in the tutorial to teach new players who are not familiar with land navigation in real life about what the “East of ?” is telling them and what to do about it then have them discover a new area as an objective. Then they can learn what that does for them when someday they have an atlas and can now look forward to that. It might encourage more exploration and reduce the number of people that get bored soon as they never leave the area they start. Other than that so far I haven’t thought of a lot that needs tweeking. Off the top of my head what I recall at the moment is something telling you how to get health and stamina regenerating would be nice fairly early. Especially health is frustrating right now how slow it regenerates and I don’t think I’m high enough level yet to be able to speed it up. An objective letting folks know early how to increase carrying capacity would be good as it’s buried further down in the skill trees. Making storage blocks I think is pretty good where it is, however, to help ahead of that it might be good suggesting to build three or more crafting tables to give them quick storage spaces. I made three and will be making my first storage block next time I play that character. I needed those tables and had the experience to know it’s needed and cheap to make. It might be good on an early crafting objective to walk new folks through “Open your Knowledge base and look up x to see what ingredients you need.” When on the making storage objective would be a good time to say something like “Good, you looked at what you needed and saw you need glue. Look up glue in your Knowledge base and learn how to make it.” Walk folks through a simple one like that once. It won’t be obvious to all how to discover what they need to do so show them once and that will prevent frustration. It will help them know how to learn anything they wish so that they can be totally self sufficient if they like or are out in the middle of nowhere with nobody to ask.

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Completely agree. I’ve been playing for about two months and have enjoyed the progression immensely. Like ElfMarine, I put gem gifts on a shelf and crafted whatever I was able to. I was pleased when I had all iron tools and very proud when I had all silver. I’m STILL tickled that I can mass craft silver tools. I gathered and mined on each planet, learning what was there, what dropped best from what, and looking up help when I got stumped (hello topaz, you old goat).

About 2 days ago I met a brand new player who asked for help. I was advising them to get off that T3 and go home to gather, and they said “Can you just give me some stuff?” :anguished: How do you tell someone not to ruin their experience by rushing without sounding like an old fart?

On the other hand, there are some things that seemed needlessly difficult to me.

  1. When I first started making machines, I didn’t know what I was making them for. I knew ancient and fresh essence must be important, but I had no idea why. I hoarded everything I ever gathered because I had no idea how essential it would be or when / if I would need it. There is some kind of critical knowledge threshold to cross from crafting??? :worried: to crafting!!! :hugs: that I just … endured.
  2. Furnaces. I still don’t know but a handful of recipes and I looked up all of them.
  3. Portals. I had the portal objective pinned for weeks. Then I had the blocks but no idea how to use / power them. Maybe that was appropriate and your first portal should be in later levels. There was no way to gauge that though, and the progression through those objectives made it seem like I should have been able to do that sooner. Maybe sorting the objectives into early/mid/late, or with suggested levels in them?
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